Paul Manafort’s legal team has forced disclosure of a troubling secret memo issued by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein that expanded the scope of the Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation beyond allegations of Russian election interference. Manafort’s lawyers have moved to have his initial and the subsequent superseding indictments for business dealings years ago dismissed because, among other reasons, Mueller had no legal authority beyond probing Russian election interference in the 2016 election when he was appointed by Rosenstein on May 17, 2017.
In response to Manafort’s motion for dismissal, this previously secret memo was revealed (with heavy redactions) expanding Mueller’s scope of investigation.
The first and obvious question is, why on Earth was this kept secret? It smacks of secret police, not an open and fair investigation.
But there is another, truly serious problem that William A. Jacobson of Legal Insurrection explains in his excellent lengthy article on the memo:
